Technology Does Not Belong to the Technologists
Sam Altman just published a set of principles for OpenAI, in which he asserts, “AI will dwarf what people could do with steam engines or electricity.”
Uh, history would like a word, Sam.
Sam believes that his talkative tool will dwarf powered transportation, powered industry, lighting, electronic communication, amplification, even computation. This is the hubris of the present tense.
What follows in his principles is the kind of sophomoric banality only an LLM could produce.
He speaks of democratization. That occurs through the institutions of government and the vote, not companies. He leaps to the conclusions that he will build the mythical AGI and that it will yield “universal prosperity” the demands “huge infrastructure” to get there.
And what does this even mean? “While we are quite confident that universal prosperity will remain really important, we can imagine periods in the future where we have to trade off some empowerment for more resilience.” In other words, he’ll hold onto power because he knows best.
I think AI’s amazing. Hell, I cohost two podcasts and I’m editing a book series about it. But for God’s sake, history teaches us that technologies — especially the two Sam so glibly dismisses — brings unforeseen consequences. Gutenberg didn’t foresee the Reformation and couldn’t have controlled it.
At least Altman’s bête noire and courtroom opponent, Musk, says even more ridiculous things, namely that saving for retirement is irrelevant because AI is going to create a world of abundance: ‘It won’t matter.’ Yeesh.
A key lesson of technological history that the technologists forget — one I write about in my books — is that once the technology becomes familiar as a tool in many hands, both the technologist and the technology fade into the background and what matters is what is made with it by others, the rest of us.
Technology does not belong to the technologists.
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